Running on a bad leg and diving awkwardly for the winning touchdown against Northwestern ... or leading a second-half victory over Purdue last year with only one good eye.

There's the frustration:

Getting penalized for spiking the ball after a bad play ... or hanging up on a teleconference with reporters because he didn't like the question.

And the bravado:

Throwing long on fourth down, in the snow, game on the line, to save a victory ... or speaking out against officiating calls in the Nebraska locker room ... or getting into a locker room fight, which led to a concussion, a hospital trip and a missed bowl game.

Those close to him say he doesn't much care what people think or say.

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Or maybe he cares so much, in another sense.

It's always been like that.

Because that's how he learned to survive, so to speak.

As a kid, McGloin not only was the youngest brother, he was the youngest of everyone in the family, everyone in all the neighborhood games.

"He's been getting knocked around since he could run," said oldest brother, Paul McGloin Jr. "He was either going to cry and go home or stay and compete."

Same with going to college. Either take the low-level promises or go to the big school of your dreams and work from the bottom up.

Then he walked into his first game as a redshirt sophomore, in an emergency, on the road, and fired a long touchdown pass. Then another.

Because to lead your teammates and your student body and your university, you have to care. Especially when you're forgotten coming out of high school. Especially when people always look for your missteps.

And even more so when a sex abuse scandal erupts and the world turns on your university and your team.

You still walk tall and you don't smile like nothing can touch you. You still hang on the company line until a question gets under your skin.

You keep the edge when everyone is looking because that's your armor and your shield.

But it's not all of you.

"I do think he enjoys the fact that he has this shell he presents," his oldest brother said. "That, 'I'm willing to fight and take on a challenge and work harder than the guy standing next to me.'

"All of those qualities make him a competitor, but they aren't the same qualities that make you a good person."

* * *

So you look deeper.

It's something even family members don't always see. But it's there.

Like with the mentally disabled adults who live in the group home in the McGloins' neighborhood, near where the boys played football and baseball and went to the carnival.

Matt never talked about it, but he knew.

When one of the residents wasn't allowed to ride the ferris wheel by himself, McGloin stepped in. He rode with the man. He talked with him. Made him feel like everyone else, which meant everything.

And he never bothered to tell anyone about it.

Years later, someone let it slip to his oldest brother.

"I don't think he cares if people think he's good or noble or important," Paul McGloin Jr. said. "He did something nice for someone else because it was the right thing to do.

"He doesn't really want to show that side ..."

So he's more than cocky or confident and intelligent, more than sarcastic and funny. More than undervalued or overachieving.

Maybe it's because being tough and living to prove wrong only provides fuel for so long. At some point, it also helps to care.

In football? He cared the way he knew how, which meant to learn the playbook better, practice harder and study more film so he would never let his teammates down.

Outside of football?

It's there, the very best part, even if he doesn't want most of the world to find it.

Something that's led him more than we ever knew.

Frank Bodani is a sports reporter for the Daily Record/Sunday News. Reach him at 771-2104, fbodani@ydr.com or @YDRPennState on Twitter.